The state of things in England, gentlemen, is too
ticklish for you to run hazards. You are accountable to Parliament for
the execution of that act according to the letter of it. Your heads
may pay for breaking it, for you certainly have broke it by
exceeding it. And as a friend, who would wish you to escape the paw of
the lion, as well as the belly of the whale, I civilly hint to you, to
keep within compass.
Sir Harry Clinton, strictly speaking, is as accountable as the rest;
for though a general, he is likewise a commissioner, acting under a
superior authority. His first obedience is due to the act; and his
plea of being a general, will not and cannot clear him as a
commissioner, for that would suppose the crown, in its single
capacity, to have a power of dispensing with an Act of Parliament.
Your situation, gentlemen, is nice and critical, and the more so
because England is unsettled. Take heed! Remember the times of Charles
the First! For Laud and Stafford fell by trusting to a hope like
yours.
Having thus shown you the danger of your proclamation, I now show
you the folly of it. The means contradict your design: you threaten to
lay waste, in order to render America a useless acquisition of
alliance to France. I reply, that the more destruction you commit
(if you could do it) the more valuable to France you make that
alliance. You can destroy only houses and goods; and by so doing you
increase our demand upon her for materials and merchandise; for the
wants of one nation, provided it has freedom and credit, naturally
produce riches to the other; and, as you can neither ruin the land nor
prevent the vegetation, you would increase the exportation of our
produce in payment, which would be to her a new fund of wealth.
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